Colorado's Department of State discovered that an update to its voter registration lookup tool had inadvertently exposed confidential voter information online, affecting 59 voters in the state.
The department made changes to the "find my voter registration" tool on August 14 to comply with new state law allowing 17-year-olds to check their registration. In updating the system, an existing filter that prevented access to confidential voter profiles was accidentally removed.
The department discovered the problem on August 25 and immediately reversed the update, restoring the protection for confidential voters. It then identified all affected voters and contacted or attempted to contact each one. The breach affected 0.04 percent of the state's 133,449 confidential voters.
The department has emailed or called 54 affected voters and sent letters to the remaining five. Accessing a voter profile through the tool requires providing a voter's legal first and last name, zip code and complete birth date.
Secretary of State Jena Griswold said: "I sincerely regret that this happened. My staff identified this issue, and we immediately fixed it and are continuing outreach to affected voters."
The department is implementing additional automated and manual testing protocols to prevent confidential voter information from becoming visible in future tool updates. The voter registration lookup tool has been publicly available since April 2010.